Identifying individuals of the sea urchin Centrostephanus rodgersii with high-quality roe in New South Wales, Australia
In: Fisheries Research. Elsevier: Amsterdam. ISSN 0165-7836; e-ISSN 1872-6763, more |  |
| Keywords | Centrostephanus rodgersii (A. Agassiz, 1864) [WoRMS]
Marine/Coastal | | Author keywords | Roe; Quality; Sea urchin; Centrostephanus rodgersii; Management |
| Abstract | The quality of sea urchin roe determines its value at market, but it is not visible to commercial divers during harvest. To aid efficiency of harvesting, the relationship between three important attributes of the quality of roe (colour, texture and granularity) and several covariates was investigated for Centrostephanus rodgersii in New South Wales, Australia. The covariates included three physical attributes of the sea urchin (roe weight, test diameter and total weight), as well as the habitat, location and reproductive period. There were significant relationships among the measures of roe quality and among the covariates. The preferred colour of roe was associated with poor granularity and texture, and roe weight was strongly associated with test diameter, reproductive period and habitat. Generalised linear models were used to estimate the probability of selecting each category of roe quality for a sea urchin with a given set of covariates. In combination, roe weight and test diameter accounted for most variation in roe quality explained by the covariates. Sea urchins with smaller test diameters and heavier roe were more likely to contain roe of a preferred colour, but less likely to contain roe of a preferred granularity and texture. Despite this contrast, physical characteristics of sea urchins and their local habitat can be used by commercial divers to enable the selection of individuals with a greater probability of containing high-quality roe. |
| Dataset | - The data underpinning analyses of the paper are deposited at GBIF, the Global Biodiversity Information Facility, http://ipt.biodiversity.aq/resource.do?r=antarctic_subantarctic_and_cold_temperate_echinoid_database, more
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